Come Away With Me
by Crystal Haze
Summary: Set near the end of PoA. Flying away on Buckbeak, Sirius realises he can't leave ... not without – him, not this time around. RLSB Oneshot


**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**Come Away With Me**

"Turn back. Just ... please turn back."

The Hippogriff inclined its massive head towards the man perched on its back.

"I need you to take me back to Hogwarts. Just ... once. Please. Now."

The man felt a beady glance fixed on him – it reminded him of someone ... who could it be, now? – and the Hippogriff keeled around and, with a flap of its great wings, was on its way back to the castle.

Sirius enmeshed his fingers in the bird's feathers and drew closer, shivering slightly in the cold. "It's a man," he murmured, and it didn't strike him as odd that he was confiding in the creature, half–horse, half–bird. "It's a man I'm in love with. I love him so much it hurts. Is it supposed to hurt? He loves me too, and that's what makes it hurt even more. I'll be gone a long while now, I don't even know when I can come back to a normal life." A normal life – the words sounded strange to him. He could have sworn he felt a deep–throated noise rumble underneath him – sympathy? "I've already been away thirteen years ... I can't leave him behind. Not ... not this time around. There ... there he is, by the lake – fly to the ground ... !"

The Hippogriff flew done in circles and touched down at the edge of the Forbidden Forest. It lowered its body elegantly, and Sirius jumped off. He saw the man sitting on a little rocky outcrop above the Lake, knees drawn towards his chest, head buried in his arms. And Sirius started running ... his robes billowed about his thin body as he ran towards him.

Remus Lupin, hearing the sound of footsteps, looked about him. As he turned around, Sirius came to a stop and fell to his knees right in front of him. "Sirius!' breathed Remus. "You're – the Dementors – I thought – oh _Sirius_... " He touched Sirius' cheek with a finger, then, fingertips running down the gaunt face, kept murmuring, "Sirius ... Sirius ... Sirius ..."

"Shh, love," whispered Sirius. He played with a lock of Remus' tawny hair. "It's all right."

He leant in and touched his mouth to Remus', a chaste brushing of the lips, almost hesitant, uncertain. When he drew away, he looked up and met Remus' eyes and that look made him tremble. The next moment, Remus' hands were cupping Sirius' face and Sirius' fingers curled in Remus' hair and their lips met in a fervent kiss. Soft, familiar lips; long–lost, but still familiar. Then Sirius drew apart, and buried his face against Remus' neck, tracing a course down his skin. Suddenly, he broke contact. Nuzzling against Remus' neck, he murmured, "Come away with me, Remus."

Remus took in his breath sharply, but he didn't reply.

Sirius lifted his head and looked deeply into Remus' eyes. "Thirteen years ... thirteen years, Remus! If you knew what I'd been through ..."

"No, Sirius," said Remus hoarsely, "If you knew what _I'd_ been through! James and Lily dead ... and you ... I should kill myself for the things I thought ... but how could I think any differently, Sirius, with everything people were saying? You don't know what it's like, I don't know if anyone does, having to doubt a person whom you love ... whom you love _so much_." His last words were a whisper.

"Come away with me," said Sirius again. "And we'll leave all of that behind. It won't matter ... because we'll have – us."

"How – ?" began Remus, shaking his head.

Sirius smiled. "Come away with me, and we'll go somewhere South. We'll go to Italy. I've always wanted to live in Italy. Italy, with its sun and sea and mountains. We'll live in a tiny apartment somewhere near the sea and we'll be together, like we haven't been these thirteen years."

"No, Sirius, Dumbledore –"

"Dumbledore be damned!" said Sirius hotly. He took Remus' hand and said earnestly. "And anyway, if he knew – if he knew _why_, do you think ...?"

"There's more to ..."

"We'll be such fools, Moony! Like when we were in school," went on Sirius, a faraway look in his eyes. "We'll walk down the main street holding hands like kids who've just fallen in love. And as we're walking, I'll sweep you in my arms and I'll kiss you, and people will cuss and move on. Some will smile at us, but mostly they'll cuss, but that won't matter to us. Nothing ever will."

Remus couldn't hold back a smile too. "Sirius," he said, caressing his cheek, "you're such a–"

"And then," continued Sirius, his smile widening, "you'll get sloshed on weekends. Dead sloshed, you're so adorably funny when you get that way. I'll take you to Church and you'll jump up on the pews mid–service and you'll yell, "Get yer ya–ya's out!" Or something totally down and dirty. It'll be such a laugh, seeing all those Catholic people give scandalous looks at each other: they could probably – what's the word? _– excommunicate_ us or something, for all you know, but it's not like we'll care."

Remus' lips twitched.

"Then we'll go out on my motorbike sometimes and when we're flying above the ocean I'll flip in mid–air and we'll both scream and whoop and throw our shirts somewhere far out to sea and it'll be ... it'll be just _so wonderful_ ... When we're done, we'll come back and we'll sit on the beach and hold hands and watch the sun go down. Very like some cliché 1950's romance movie, but we'll love it all the same."

"Really, Sirius –"

"There'll be evenings when we'll want to just sit at home together. Side by side, in front of the fire, staring at the glow, we'll just stay there all night ... we won't talk much, but I'll know what you're thinking of anyway, because I'll be thinking of that too."

He stopped to look at Remus. Then, after a pause, that old smile plastered on his lips, he went on.

"But don't think I'll be taking you out for those football matches, you know, that Muggle game Lily used to love, though Italian football is supposed to be really good and everything. Oh no. Those Italian blokes are much too good–looking for my peace of mind. My Moony will ogle only me, and no one else.

"But I can take you out for a few of those opera things, if you like. You know, where they sing so high you expect your tympanum to rip any moment. So halfway through, I'll get bored, and I'll start feeling you up, and you'll make those cute little pissed–off noises and you'll keep shifting away, but I won't stop because it'll piss you off more and more and you know how I adore doing that."

Remus half–laughed. "You – "

"And after the full moon," went on Sirius, "when we're lying out together in some open place when the sun's about to come up, you'll reach out for me and you'll fuck me senseless. You'll fuck me till I can't breathe, and then I'll take over and I'll fuck you some more."

Looking at him, Remus' laugh died in his throat. Suddenly, he gripped Sirius by the shoulders and kissed him with an almost feral look in his eyes. Sirius, gasping, collapsed backwards, and Remus straddled him, laying him down on the grass. Sirius felt a wet tongue flick against his lips, prising his mouth open; he moaned appreciatively, gathering the front of Remus' robes in his hand as Remus' tongue slipped sensuously inside him.

At last, panting, Remus withdrew. His eyes still burned as he brushed away a few strands of Sirius' hair, slick with sweat, from his forehead.

"I love it when you do that," said Sirius softly, grinning up at the werewolf. "I'd almost forgotten how–"

But Remus silenced him mid–sentence, closing the distance between them with another kiss. This time, he nipped at Sirius' ear, sliding a tongue inside it, then gave him a vicious love–bite on the soft skin of his neck; once, twice. He slid his hand down Sirius' throat, fumbling with the buttons. Sirius half–lifted up his hand to manoeuvre Remus' fingers.

Then Remus, breathing heavily, rolled off him and lay on his side, and closed his eyes.

Sirius turned over till he, too, lay on his side, facing Remus. "Remus," he murmured, and he gently stroked Remus' hand, till he opened his eyes. He laid the length of Remus' palm against his and, intertwining their fingers, whispered, "We'll grow old together ..."

Remus lowered his eyes and became absorbed in a ladybird that was climbing up a blade of grass.

For a long while, Sirius lay just looking at him; at his slightly messy hair, those lowered eyelids, his thin, sensitive mouth, that tiny spot on the left corner of his upper lip – he knew it all ... it was all, he thought, and a shiver crept down his spine, it was all _his _... every inch of it belonged to him: he owned every hair on that tawny head, every eyelash, every line in that thin face ... where else in the world could Remus be, but with him?

"Remus ..." he said. Remus looked up at him, his beautiful amber eyes quiet and thoughtful.

"Come away with me," said Sirius huskily, tugging at his collar, "or I'm afraid I'm going to have to abduct you."

There was a long pause.

Suddenly, Remus straightened up and got to his feet. "That," he said, and his voice had a very different sound to it, "won't be necessary."

Sirius stared at him, momentarily at a loss for words. Of all the reactions he had expected from Remus Lupin ... "But," he said, getting up quickly, "are you ... I mean, yes, of course, but ... your – your stuff?"

Remus, who had almost reached Buckbeak, didn't even turn back. "Are you coming or not?" he called over his shoulder.

Positively bewildered now, shaking his head as if to make sure that all of this was real, Sirius hurried up to him. As he climbed onto the Hippogriff's back behind Remus, still convinced this _isn't_, _couldn't_ be happening, suddenly Remus said, "Hey, Sirius?"

"Yeah?"

"Just ... don't tell Harry, will you?"

Sirius put his arms around the shorter man's waist and rested his head on his shoulder. "No," he murmured, "I won't." Then, with a grin, he added "And, to be frank, I wouldn't really expect him to work it out, either."

Laughing, Remus held on tightly to the back of Buckbeak's neck, wondering if this could really be Sirius' breath, warm on his shoulders, Sirius' whispered words, tickling the small hairs on the nape of his neck, as the creature rose up, higher and higher, away towards the rising sun.

-:-

**A/N: **Yes I know they don't get together until the end of GOF, and I do love the 'Lie low at Lupin's thing', but this seemed something Sirius would do.


End file.
